Another season has come and gone and the treasure hunters on The Curse of Oak Island feel like they’re getting closer to finally solving the never-ending riddles that continue to pop up. Will Season 6 of the reality TV series finally resolve the 223-year-old unsolved mystery?

Airing on the History Channel, Oak Island is the No. 1 non-scripted series on cable. It’s safe to assume there’s an audience out there who wants to see some results after the crew has spent millions of dollars in heavy equipment, supplies and everything else in order to get a little closer to finding concrete answers as to what might lie underneath the surface of this Nova Scotia property. But there’s plenty of detractors out there, as well, who deny there’s anything beneath the Canadian island, and so much of the show has been created just for ratings. Then there’s people like me who just enjoy the research and historical findings the on-camera representations of the show have found, in search of the truth, even if nothing is ever truly “found.”

The season finale, “Lost and Founding” revealed a few more nuggets of information, while promising to get the results of the crew’s underground seismic testing that took place in the swamp, trying to uncover any man-made objects or structures that might appear as anomalies… just in time for the season premiere of Season 7. Seems convenient enough.

There was also a worker’s strike that prevented any heavy machinery work around the Money Pit to be completed. A few more coins and pieces of parchment were found. Slipway wood was professionally dated to 1769, which was approximately 25 years before the Money Pit was created. And yet another bizarre new theory was floated out there: Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and the Founding Fathers of America could have been told about the treasure, which possibly financed The Revolutionary War, totally rewriting U.S. history. As the crew continues to search for a flood tunnel convergence point in Smith’s Cove, while dodging possible booby traps, a mystery wall emerges.

“Another day, another structure.”

But hints of Marty’s departure surface. Marty Lagina has been the stick in the mud for this crew multiple times in the past, casting doubt on ever finding any true treasure. Has he given up his Oak Island quest bfor good, disbanding the treasure-hunting fellowship after all this time, money and effort that he invested? Moving on to his spin-off project, Marty’s son, Alex Lagina, has now joined his father in participating on The Curse of Civil War Gold. At the end of the show’s first season, Marty had finally agreed to finance Kevin Dykstra’s journey to locating the loot that he thinks was revealed in a deathbed confessional. Could it be lying at the bottom of Lake Michigan? Maybe this show can be filmed cheaper than enduring the elements on Oak Island, and can possibly be stretched out to an even longer amount of time for a television series.

With crossover “characters” and a crossover storyline, it’s the perfect time for Marty to defect. But what kind of adverse effects will this cause to Oak Island? We will have to wait and see to be sure. One thing is certain: The brotherly bond and group-dynamic fellowship will definitely be different next season without Marty around. Whether being negative or actually “realistic,” Marty has been a big part of Oak Island‘s success. He brings credibility to Civil War Gold and Alex brings… effort. Here’s to hoping for the success of both shows next season.